Jax nodded gratefully and headed for the bathroom. In a few minutes, Cade heard the shower start up. He actually got to his feet to walk in there, the idea of slipping in beside his boy in the shower and bending him over almost getting the better of him. He stopped short of the door by sternly reminding himself what a major pig he would be to take advantage of the kid in his exhausted condition and turned to throw himself back down on the bed in frustration.

Rayce knocked, and when Cade answered the door, he carried in a sleeping Mason. They pulled off his jacket and shoes and covered him up. Rayce assured Cade that he and Connor were right next door if he needed anything.

Jax walked back out after about ten minutes, self-consciously wrapped up in a couple of towels, and Cade marched stiffly past him to the shower, careful not to touch him. Turning the water on cold, he stood under the spray as long as he could stand it, until his rigid cock finally got the message it wasn’t going to see any action tonight. Then he turned on a little warm water and washed himself quickly. By the time he got back out, the boy was already in his bed beside Mason and had the blankets pulled up almost over his head. Soft snores told Cade that Jax was already asleep.

Cade fell down on his back on the bed beside him and reached over to turn off the lamp. He stared at the dim lights that came from the parking lot outside and watched them dance on the ceiling for a while before he convinced himself to shut his eyes.

He woke up after a few hours of troubled sleep and smelled cigarette smoke coming from outside the room. Suspecting it was Connor and grateful he didn’t have to make himself lie there any longer, he got up and pulled on a pair of jeans, moving quietly to the door. Sure enough, Connor leaned against the building, having a quiet smoke. The door to the room beside him was slightly open. Cade nodded at him and spoke softly, not wanting to wake Jax. “Still puffing on those things? You really need to give them up.”

Connor shrugged. He’d picked up a lot of bad habits in the last year or so, and their mother would have a fit if she saw him smoking. Cade had picked up the habit himself when he was spending most of his time in bars, but had kicked it a couple years before. Wolf shifters were immune to human diseases, but it smelled bad, especially to Cade’s sensitive nose, and he’d hated the addictive quality cigarettes brought with them. He abhorred the idea that he had to have anything—it fucking pissed him off—one of the problems he was having with a soif de sang.

“Yeah, I know. I’ll probably quit once we make it to the mountains.” They stood companionably beside each other for a moment before Connor spoke again. “Couldn’t sleep. I kept thinking about how lucky you are to have found your soif de sang, even if you do treat him like shit. I hope I’ll be lucky enough to have one.”

“What do you mean I treat him like shit?” Cade said tersely. “I haven’t hurt him. I fed him, bought him stuff. Got him away from those truckers. I’m taking care of him. What the hell else do you expect me to do? Rock him to sleep? Fuck, are you kidding me?”

“Get pissed off if you want to, bro. But you make it pretty damn obvious he’s a burden, a pain in your ass. I call that treating him like shit.”

“Watch your damn mouth, bro. I’m your alpha now, and don’t you forget it. And if that doesn’t suit you, join Zack’s pack when we get there. Or hell, go home.”

Connor stood up and flicked his cigarette out onto the parking lot before turning to face his brother. “I’m not being disrespectful, Cade. And I never said I didn’t want to be in your pack. I’m here, right? I left all my family and friends behind, everything I knew to follow you. But I’ve never seen you act like you do with this kid. You take good care of him physically, I guess, but he’s scared to death of you. I see it—we all see it, though he’s a tough little bastard and tries to act like he doesn’t care.”

Cade made a scoffing noise and turned his back, but Connor pulled him back around. “Listen to me, Cade. You’ve been given a gift. Something really special. How can you turn your back on it like this? It’s the most intense bond any of us ever could have in this world. It’s even stronger than the blood match, and God knows that’s a life-changer.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about, damn it. I never asked for this shit, and I don’t want it. This thing is a double-edged sword. The word means bloodlust, and that says it all, Connor. I lust after that kid in there. What does that make me? Have you seen him? I like women, Connor, or hell, maybe a man occasionally. A man, though, not some damn kid who looks like he’s fucking twelve.”

“Then send him away.”

“Send him away? I can’t, damn it. I want him so damn much it makes my stomach hurt, and I won’t be able to rest until I taste his blood. And once I do, only his blood will sustain me. I’ll make him a blood whore, and I’ll be his.”

He ran a hand over his face and sagged back against the wall. “Damn it, is he really as damn pretty as I think heis? It’s hard to tell through this haze I get over my eyes whenever I get too close to him.”

Connor turned to him. “Yeah, he’s beautiful. You’re a lucky man, like I said. I don’t understand why you’re fighting this so hard. I mean, yeah, he looks like he’s twelve, but he’s not. He’s nineteen, right?”

“Do you even understand what a soif de sangis?”

“Well, not totally, I guess. It’s like a mate, though, right? I know that they’re like insanely rare, and not everyone gets to find one. He’s your true match, right? Why would you say you’ll both be blood whores?”

“Because once I taste him, and he tastes me, that’s what we’ll be. It’s like a blood match, only even more intense, and this one goes both ways. With the blood match, the mate has to feed from the wolf every few weeks to keep from going feral. But with the soif de sang, both the wolf and the mate have to share blood. They feed from each other. If they don’t, they don’t go feral, they fucking die, Connor. And the scent—the scent is maddening, like nothingI’ve ever experienced before. When I walked into that diner and saw him, smelled him, it was all I could do not to shift in that big roomful of other humans, pounce on him, and drink his blood. I wanted him so badly my hands were shaking, and it took all my strength not to…to…ravish him.”

Connor laughed uneasily. “Ravish him? I haven’t heard of anybody using that word since, I don’t know, the turn of the last century?”

Cade looked back at him, the corners of his lips lifting slightly. “Me neither, but it’s oddly appropriate. When I first touched him, it stunned me. You and Rayce thought I was being stubborn in not going after him right away, but I couldn’t. I literally couldn’t make myself get up out of that chair. I was so afraid he was underage. Do you understand…do you have any idea how frightening that was?”

“I’m beginning to.”

“He’s been through some kind of trauma. I can sense that already, and I’ll only make it worse. Once our bond has been made, we’ll become almost like one person. If he feels pain or unhappiness, I’ll feel it too. We won’t be able to live without each other, and won’t be able to be separated for more than a few days at a time. We’ll have to drink each other’s blood to survive. Just take a moment to imagine that. No matter if we’re fighting or angry, no matter what we feel for each other, we’ll have to make love because that’s when the blood connection is made.”

Connor was quiet for a moment, staring out at the rain-soaked parking lot.“Since he’ll share my life, he’ll also share the shape-shift, but there’s no help for it. I can try to give him until we reachGeorgia, but then I won’t be able to stop myself from mating with him and giving him the mark. Somehow I have to bond with him before then.”

Connor put a hand on his shoulder and kept it there. “No matter what you say, Rayce said you were fortunate. You’ll have an unbreakable bond, and you’ll find your true match with him.”

“Rayce is wrong—there’s nothing fortunate about this. The bloodlust is unspeakable.” Cade was quiet for a long time, staring out at the deserted parking lot until he could sense Connor’s restlessness beside him. “C’mon, you’re cold. Let’s get back to our beds. We’ll have to travel all day tomorrow to get there, soit’ll be a long damn day.”

Connor nodded and disappeared back into his room. Cade stood for a moment or two longer before turning back to his own room. Immediately, he tensed, his body freezing in place. He sensed that Jax was wide awake. The door to the room had been slightly open so he could hear him if he needed anything. Now it struck Cade that Jax may have been awake for a while. He could have heard every word of what he said to Connor.

Cade sat down on the side of the bed. Mason was still sound asleep, and Jax had his back turned to him, but Cade saw him trembling. Finally, slowly, Jax turned his face toward him, his eyes wide in his small face.

“W-what are you?”

Cade took a deep breath and thought for the briefest of moments about lying to him, or at least giving him some watered-down version of the truth. But when he opened his mouth, the truth came spilling out. “I guess I’m what you would call a werewolf.”

Jax gasped for breath and jerked upright in the bed. He glanced once at Mason and then at the door as if trying to calculate his chances of grabbing Mason and making a run for it.

“Don’t try it, Jax,” Cade said quietly. “You know I’ll catch you and bring you back.”

Jax didn’t reply at first, just sat there breathing hard and gripping his knees with his hands so hard Cade was sure he’d have bruises there in the morning. He let him try to assimilate what he’d said before he spoke quietly again. “I’m not going to harm you—you should realize that by now. None of us want to hurt you.”

“This-this isn’t real.” Jax shook his head. “It’s not real. I’ve got to be dreaming.”